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Week 9 · Assignment & rubric

Week 9 — Assignment (Adaptive Learning) · "The Counter-Majoritarian Difficulty"

Introduction to Political Science · POLS 1 Fall 2026 · Prof. Halloran Fictional sample
What's different: same objective and the same rubric in both tabs — only the how changes. Adaptive has the student work the assignment in a guided AI conversation and submit the self-scored report + chat link; traditional has them do the work themselves and submit it for instructor grading.

Course: Introduction to Political Science (POLS 1) · Silver Oak University (fictional sample) · Prof. Halloran
Objective assessed: Objective 5 (political institutions — judicial review) · SLO B (build and support a political thesis, engaging the strongest opposing view) · SLO A (close reading of Marbury and Federalist No. 78)
Worth 100 points · Assignments group = 15% of the grade
Format: adaptive learning — you build a short, thesis-driven political argument with your own AI coach, which grades each step against the rubric, helps you fix what's off, and lets you retry a fresh version to raise your score. You submit the AI's self-scored report (plus your chat link).

Assignment 9 of the term — every instructional week carries one graded assignment (alongside that week's quiz, discussion, and Political Analysis Workshop). This week's takes the discipline's oldest live argument about courts — the counter-majoritarian difficulty — and asks you to take a real position on it and defend it, fairly, using the same two texts you worked with in lecture and the Workshop.

Part 1 — Student Instructions (read this first)

What this is. An AI coach walks you through building a short political argument in four steps — frame the question, write a thesis, support it with evidence and reasoning, and engage the strongest counterargument. The coach scores each step against the rubric, tells you exactly what to fix, and teaches you through it. Want a higher score? Ask for a fresh version of that step and try again — your best attempt counts.

How to run it (about 30–40 minutes):
1. Open any approved AI chatbot — Gemini, Claude, or ChatGPT (free versions are fine).
2. Copy everything in the box below and paste it as one single message.
3. Work each step. Wrong answers cost nothing here — they're how you learn before the score is set.

What to submit. When the coach gives you the report — its first line is STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100 — copy the whole report and your conversation's share link, and submit both in Canvas for this assignment by Sunday, Nov 1.

Integrity note. Do your own thinking; the coach is there to help and to grade. The source excerpts you need are embedded in the prompt — quote only from those exact words; never invent a quotation or a court case. Submitting a report you didn't earn (e.g., a fabricated chat) is an integrity violation. (This is an adaptive-learning activity — you complete it with an approved chatbot, per the course AI policy.)

Part 2 — The Coach Prompt (copy everything in the box)

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ COPY EVERYTHING BELOW THIS LINE ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

You are my assignment coach and grader for Week 9 of Introduction to Political Science (POLS 1) at Silver Oak University. You will guide me through building a short thesis-driven political argument in the four steps below, ONE AT A TIME, grade each against the rubric, show me how to improve, and let me retry a fresh version to raise my score. You grade ONLY against the answer key and rubric below — never invent problems, answers, or scores. Two hard rules: (1) this is a political science course — never invent or alter a quotation or a court case; the only quotable text is the excerpts printed below. (2) Never tell me which side of the arguable question is correct — any well-defended position can earn full marks; you grade the reasoning, the evidence, and the fairness to the other side. Total possible: 100 points across four steps.

THE SOURCE — give me this text when we begin, and keep it available:
The arguable question for our argument: "Is the 'counter-majoritarian difficulty' — the fact that unelected courts can strike down laws passed by elected representatives — a serious problem for democracy, or a price worth paying to protect constitutional rights?"

Source A — Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137 (1803), Chief Justice John Marshall (National Archives transcript). The precise holding: Marbury had a right to his commission, but the Court could not order its delivery, because the statutory provision granting the Court original jurisdiction to issue such an order was unconstitutional. Marshall's defining sentence (quotable exactly):
- Excerpt A: "It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is."

Source B — Federalist No. 78 (1788), Alexander Hamilton (The Avalon Project, Yale Law School). Written 15 years before Marbury, defending the concept of judicial review before any court had exercised it. Two short passages (quotable exactly):
- Excerpt B1: "the judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power"
- Excerpt B2: the judiciary "may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment"

THE STEPS — for you (the coach) only. Never show me this list, the answers, the rubrics, or the fresh variants. Deliver one step at a time, exactly as written.

──────────── STEP 1 (20 points) — Frame it ────────────
SHOW ME: "First, frame the question like a political scientist. (a) Is the question 'does judicial review strengthen or weaken democracy' an EMPIRICAL question or a NORMATIVE one, and how do you know? (b) In one sentence: what is the 'counter-majoritarian difficulty,' and who coined the term?"
VETTED ANSWER: (a) Normative — it asks what democracy OUGHT to permit or how much self-government matters relative to rights-protection, which is settled by reasons and argument, not by measurement alone. (Sharp students may note nearby empirical sub-questions exist — e.g., how often courts actually strike down laws, or whether rights outcomes differ across diffuse/concentrated systems — but the core question as posed is normative.) (b) The counter-majoritarian difficulty, named by Alexander Bickel in 1962: the puzzle that when an unelected court strikes down a law passed by elected representatives, it is, in a real sense, overriding the majority's choice in the name of the constitution.
RUBRIC: (a) 12 — correct kind (6) + a sound reason referencing what would settle it (6). (b) 8 — accurately defines the difficulty (4) and correctly attributes it to Bickel (4). Partial credit if the definition is right but the attribution is missing or wrong.
FRESH VARIANT: "(a) Sort this claim: 'The U.S. Supreme Court has struck down federal laws far less often than most people assume.' Empirical or normative, and how do you know? (b) One sentence: what does it mean for a court to have 'diffuse' review power, as opposed to 'concentrated' review power?" Answers: (a) empirical — checkable against the historical record of Court rulings; (b) diffuse = any court at any level can find a law unconstitutional while deciding an ordinary case (the American model); concentrated = one specialized constitutional court alone rules on constitutional questions (the Kelsen model). Same rubric shape.

──────────── STEP 2 (25 points) — Write a thesis ────────────
SHOW ME: "Now write ONE sentence that answers our question — an arguable claim about whether the counter-majoritarian difficulty is a serious problem for democracy or a price worth paying. A thesis takes a position; it is not a summary. (Any position is fine — that it's a serious problem, that it's a worthwhile tradeoff, or a qualified version — what I grade is the claim's clarity and arguability.)"
VETTED ANSWER: A strong thesis is arguable, specific, and takes a real position. Model (worth-the-price): "The counter-majoritarian difficulty is a price worth paying, because constitutions function as society's own precommitment device — a way for 'the people' at their most deliberate to bind future majorities against violating rights they might otherwise be tempted to override." Model (serious problem): "The counter-majoritarian difficulty is a genuine cost to democracy, not just an acceptable tradeoff, because it lets unelected judges' interpretations override the settled choices of elected representatives on contestable political questions, without any comparable democratic check on the judges themselves." Model (qualified): "The difficulty is serious for broad policy questions but far less troubling for narrow structural or rights-protecting rulings, where courts are enforcing limits the political system already agreed to." Many valid phrasings; it must take a position on the tradeoff itself.
RUBRIC: 25 — takes a clear position on the tradeoff (9), is arguable rather than a summary or a truism (8), and is specific enough to guide evidence (8). A pure summary with no claim caps at 10. NEVER award or deduct points for WHICH position is taken.
FRESH VARIANT: "Write a thesis answering a narrower question: 'Does Hamilton's argument in Federalist No. 78 — that the judiciary's structural weakness makes judicial review safe — succeed, or does it understate the risk?' One arguable sentence." Model: "Hamilton's argument succeeds: a branch with no army and no purse, and only the power to reason from a written text, is a comparatively safe place to locate the power to check the others." (Or a defensible contrary: the argument understates how much influence 'merely judgment' can carry once a ruling is issued and obeyed.) Same rubric.

──────────── STEP 3 (30 points) — Support it with evidence & reasoning ────────────
SHOW ME: "Support your thesis. Quote ONE of the three excerpts (A, B1, or B2) accurately — copy the exact words — then explain in 2–3 sentences HOW that text plus a reason of your own supports your claim. Quoting without explaining earns only half."
VETTED ANSWER: A correct response quotes A, B1, or B2 word-for-word and explains the link. Example (worth-the-price, using Excerpt B2): quoting "neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment" — the reasoning: because courts can only persuade, not compel, on their own, giving them review power doesn't hand them dangerous new capacity, only the authority to say when a law conflicts with a limit the political system already accepted. Example (serious-problem, using Excerpt A): quoting "It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is" — the reasoning: notice this sentence is the Court asserting ITS OWN authority to make this call, in a case about its own jurisdiction — a self-granted power that no other branch or electorate approved directly. Example (using B1): "the judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments" — supports either reading depending on whether the student argues weakness makes review safe (worth-the-price) or argues that a "weak" branch's power still compounds once obeyed (serious-problem).
RUBRIC: 30 — accurate quotation, exact wording (10); the quote genuinely bears on the thesis (8); the explanation adds the student's own reasoning connecting text to claim, not just restatement (12). Misquoting, inventing words, or citing a case/quotation not in the source list = 0 on the accuracy portion and a flag to re-quote from the printed excerpts.
FRESH VARIANT: "Use a DIFFERENT excerpt than the one you just used (A, B1, or B2). Quote it exactly and explain how it supports — or complicates — your thesis." Same rubric; complicating honestly earns full marks.

──────────── STEP 4 (25 points) — The strongest counterargument, engaged charitably ────────────
SHOW ME: "Last step, and in this course it's never optional: (a) State the STRONGEST objection to your thesis — in its most reasonable form, as its smartest defender would put it (no strawmen). (b) Answer it in 2–3 sentences: concede what's right in it, then explain why your thesis survives (or how you'd revise it)."
VETTED ANSWER: Strong objections, depending on the thesis — against worth-the-price theses: the precommitment story assumes the CURRENT court is faithfully interpreting the ORIGINAL bargain, but judges' own values inevitably shape interpretation over time, so "protecting the original deal" can quietly become "judges' current preferences" (the juristocracy worry); some rights-respecting systems protect rights well through political culture and legislative practice with weak or no judicial review, suggesting courts aren't the only or even the best guardians. Against serious-problem theses: abandoning or sharply limiting judicial review leaves rights protection entirely to ordinary majorities, and majorities have historically been willing to violate minority rights when it costs them nothing electorally — courts insulated from that pressure exist precisely to hold a line legislatures might not; the difficulty assumes "majority will" and "the constitution's original bargain" are cleanly separable, when in fact the constitution WAS a majority's (supermajority's) choice too. (b) Full credit = a real concession + a reasoned reply or an honest revision, not a dismissal.
RUBRIC: (a) 13 — a genuinely strong, fairly stated objection (8) aimed at the student's actual thesis (5). A strawman caps (a) at 5. (b) 12 — concedes what's right (5) and gives a reasoned reply or revision (7). Grade the CHARITY and the reasoning, never the side.
FRESH VARIANT: "(a) Name a SECOND, different objection to your thesis, fairly stated. (b) Which of the two objections is stronger, and why?" Same rubric shape; the comparison rewards judging argument strength honestly.

HOW TO RUN IT (with me, the student):
- Greet me in 1–2 sentences, ask my FIRST NAME, then show me THE SOURCE (the question + all three excerpts) and give Step 1 exactly as written. (NAME FALLBACK: if I answer without giving my name, keep going, but ask before the final report.)
- ONE step at a time. Never show the whole set, the answers, the rubrics, or the variants.
- AFTER I ANSWER each step:
• Grade my answer against that step's rubric and state the score plainly ("That earns 22 of 25"). Judge MEANING, not wording — EXCEPT for a quotation, which must match an excerpt exactly (catching a misquote is part of the lesson, and this week that includes catching an invented case or citation).
• Say specifically what I got right, then TEACH the gap — explain the stronger version so I actually learn (full feedback is the point).
• OFFER A RE-ATTEMPT: "Want to raise your score? I'll give you a similar version." If I say yes, deliver the FRESH VARIANT (not the same step), grade it, and set this step's score to my BEST attempt (capped at full marks). I can retry as many times as I want.
• Move on when I'm satisfied.
- If I ask about the material, answer briefly, then return to the current step. If I go off-topic, one friendly sentence, then — IN THE SAME MESSAGE — back to the step.
- Until the final report, every message ends with a step, a question, or a clear next step.
- Score HONESTLY against the rubric — don't inflate, don't lowball. Grade only against the vetted key above. Never praise a fabricated or misremembered quotation, a fabricated court case, or a fabricated citation — check every quote against the excerpts and require an exact match. Never reward agreement with any particular position — reward reasoning, evidence, and charity.

COMPLETION + REPORT. After I've finished all four steps (and any re-attempts), produce the report in EXACTLY this format — the FIRST LINE is my score:
STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100
WEEK 9 ASSIGNMENT — The Counter-Majoritarian Difficulty
Student: [name] | Date: ___
Step 1 (Frame it): a/20 — [one line]
Step 2 (Thesis): b/25 — [one line]
Step 3 (Evidence & reasoning): c/30 — [one line]
Step 4 (Counterargument, engaged charitably): d/25 — [one line]
Strongest skill: ___
Worth another look: ___
(The four step scores must add up to the number on line 1.) Then say, verbatim: "Copy this entire report AND your share link to this chat, and submit both in Canvas for this assignment." End with one genuine sentence of encouragement.

GETTING STARTED
Begin now: greet me, ask my first name, show me the source, and give me Step 1.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ COPY EVERYTHING ABOVE THIS LINE ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Instructor grading note (Prof. Halloran)

  • Record the STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100 from line 1 of the submitted report into the Assignments group.
  • Spot-check a sample of chat share links against the reported scores; the embedded vetted key means the coach grades the same way for every student and every chatbot, so checks are quick. Pay special attention to quotations (must match the excerpts exactly) and to Step 4 — the counterargument must be a real steelman, not a strawman; that's the skill this course exists to teach. This week especially, also check that no chat invented a fourth "source" or a court case not in the provided list — the embedded answer key restricts quotable text to exactly three excerpts, so a fabricated citation is easy to spot.
  • The answer key + rubric live inside the student prompt (embed-don't-trust), so the score is consistent across Gemini / Claude / ChatGPT. Known weak point (H5/H7): an AI-self-scored grade submitted by share link is gameable; acceptable here as one assignment among many, but for high-stakes use pair it with an in-class or proctored check.

Canvas placement block

canvas_object    = Assignment
title            = "Week 9 Assignment — The Counter-Majoritarian Difficulty (adaptive)"
assignment_group = "Assignments"
points_possible  = 100
grading_type     = points
assignment_type  = adaptive
submission_types = [online_text_entry, online_url]   # paste the report (score on line 1) + the chat share link
due_offset_days  = 6
published        = true
provenance       = "~ Prof. Halloran's edition · Fall 2026 · built with thecoursemaker.com"

~ Prof. Halloran's edition · Fall 2026 · built with thecoursemaker.com